a. Field of the Invention
The present disclosure relates generally to a remote catheter guidance system (RCGS) for a medical device, and more particularly to a multi-user touch-based input interface for an RCGS.
b. Background Art
Electrophysiology (EP) catheters are used in a variety of diagnostic and/or therapeutic medical procedures to correct conditions such as atrial arrhythmia, including for example, ectopic atrial tachycardia, atrial fibrillation, and atrial flutter. Arrhythmia can create a variety of dangerous conditions including irregular heart rates, loss of synchronous atrioventricular contractions and stasis of blood flow which can lead to a variety of ailments.
In a typical EP procedure, a physician manipulates a catheter through a patient's vasculature to, for example, a patient's heart. The catheter typically carries one or more electrodes that may be used for mapping, ablation, diagnosis, and the like. Once at the target tissue site, the physician commences diagnostic and/or therapeutic procedures, for example, ablative procedures such as radio frequency (RF), microwave, cryogenic, laser, chemical, acoustic/ultrasound or high-intensity focused ultrasound (HIFU) ablation, to name a few different sources of ablation energy. The resulting lesion, if properly located and sufficiently contiguous with other lesions, disrupts undesirable electrical pathways and thereby limits or prevents stray electrical signals that can lead to arrhythmias. Such procedures require precise control of the catheter during navigation to and delivery of therapy to the target tissue site, which can be a function of a user's skill level.
Robotic catheter systems are known to facilitate such precise control. Robotic catheter systems generally carry out (as a mechanical surrogate) input commands of a clinician or other end-user to deploy, navigate and manipulate a catheter and/or an introducer or sheath for a catheter or other elongate medical instrument, for example, a robotic catheter system described, depicted, and/or claimed in U.S. application Ser. No. 12/347,811 entitled “ROBOTIC CATHETER SYSTEM,” owned by the common assignee of the present disclosure and hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety as though fully set forth herein. Such robotic catheter systems include a variety of actuation mechanisms, such as electric motors, for controlling translation and deflection of the catheter and associated sheath. A variety of input devices are generally used, such as a mouse, keyboard, joystick, and touch screen. But known input mechanisms and interfaces for robotic catheter systems limit the types of input actions available to a user and the speed and precision with which a user can enter those input actions.
There is therefore a need for improved systems and methods that enhance clinician control while reducing the time required for a robotic procedure to thereby minimize or eliminate one or more problems noted above.